Rollin', rollin', rollin'
Right, so where do we start? We Love Katamari is an unashamed continuation of the original Katamari Damacy, and during the cutscenes regular reference is made to the original game. But unusually for such a Japanese themed game there is a superb amount of self-depreciation that us Westerners will find particularly endearing. We Love Katamari doesn’t just mock itself but thoroughly takes the mick as often as it can… which is a cool thing as far as we’re concerned.
The gameplay remains utterly unchanged from the original and for those few that have played the first game, this is really more of an extra set of levels than anything new. That’s not to say that seasoned players won’t enjoy the game, it’s just that there’s not really anything new here to see. But seeing as the first game was overlooked by the vast majority of gamers, its not going to be a major issue.
The front end of the game is called the Select Meadow, which gives you access to all the various areas in the game, be that the to save your game, change options or look at what you’ve collected so far. Most importantly, dotted around the meadow are several people who all have various Katamari related requests. Using your character, (you collect more as you progress), you run up to them and have a quick chat as they tell you what they want. You then fly up to the heavens, have another chin wag with the King of All Cosmos and then start the game proper.
The style of the front end is very cartoony and reminds me very much of a Talking Heads album cover, Little Creatures, painted by Rev. Howard Finster… it’s a childlike representation of the world but full of little detail and general trippy stuff like elephants and pandas, talking dogs and girls in kimonos… the game, I mean, not the album. That said, I reckon Keita Takahashi, the Director of We Love Katamari and the creator of the original Katamari Damacy has been on the same stuff as the Rev Finster… its chilled out hippy trippy stuff.
